New evidence unearthed by the German Newspaper Handelsblatt indicates that senior Israeli military and government officials received illegal payments from the German company which has supplied the Israeli army’s submarines.
According to the expose Israel is one of three countries (the others are Greece and South Africa) in which ThyssenKrupp Company paid bribes to Israeli officials in order to win contracts to build surface vessels and submarines.
There is an ongoing police investigation into PM Netanyahu’s involvement in this affair. Last week former war minister Moshe Ya’alon gave detailed evidence to police on this matter. Following his testimony police announced that the preliminary investigation of this affair will evolve into another full-blown corruption investigation against the Prime Minister.
This investigation is now likely to be broadened and include allegations that several senior Israeli military officers and ministry officials also received corrupt payments from the German company.
According to a Channel 2 report Ya’alon told police that Netanyahu was personally involved in attempts to bypass his ministry’s standard purchase requirements including the publication of tenders to relevant companies.
The affair broke several weeks ago following the expose on David Shimron’s involvement in the negotiations with ThyssenKrup the German conglomerate that owns the shipyards that build the submarines.
Shimron is Netanyahu’s long time personal lawyer and was deeply involved in the negotiations to purchase new submarines. He reportedly gave the German company an ultimatum that if they wanted to complete the deal they must replace their long-time representative in Israel and appoint Michael (Miki) Ganor a close friend of Shimron and Netanyahu as their representative in Israel.
